Feeling Anxious? Be Alert!

When you feel anxious, anxiety-ridden, what is one to do? What do you ordinarily do when anxiety is there? You try to solve it. You try alternatives, and you get more and more into it. You will create a bigger mess because anxiety cannot be solved through thinking. It cannot be dissolved through thinking because thinking itself is a sort of anxiety.

This technique says don’t do anything with anxiety. Just be alert!

I will tell you one old anecdote about Bokuju, another Zen Master. He lived alone in a cave, but during the day, or even in the night, he would sometimes say loudly, “Bokuju” his own name, and then he would say, “Yes, I am here.” And no one else was there.

Then his disciple used to ask him, “Why are you calling “Bokuju” your own name, and then saying, ‘yes sir, I am here’?”  He said, “Whenever I get into thinking, I have to remember to be alert, and so I call my own name, Bokuju. The moment I call Bokuju and I say, ‘yes sir, I am here, the thinking, the anxiety disappears.”
Then, in his last days, for two or three years, he never called “Bokuju” his name, and never had to reply, “Yes sir, I am here.” The disciple asked, “Master, now you never do this.”

So he said, “But now Bokuju is always there. He is always there, and there is no need. Before I used to miss him. Sometimes the anxiety would take me, cloud me all over, and Bokuju was not there. So I had to remember Bokuju, and the anxiety would disappear…”

Try your own name. When you feel deep anxiety, just call your name – not “Bokuju” or any other name , but your name –and then reply to it, “Yes sir, I am here,” and feel the difference. Anxiety will not be there. At lease for a single moment you will have a glimpse beyond the clouds, and that glimpse can be deepened.

Once you know that if you become alert anxiety is not there, it disappears; you have come to a deep knowing of your own self and the mechanism of inner working. 

People that come into your life.

Sometimes people come into your life and you know right away that they were meant to be there, to serve some sort of purpose, teach you a lesson, or to help you figure out who you are or who you want to become. You never know who these people may be possibly your roommate, neighbor, co-worker, longest friend, lover, or even a complete stranger but when you lock eyes with them, you know at that very moment that they will affect your life in some profound way. 

Some people come into our lives and quickly go.
Some people move our souls to dance.
They awaken us to new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom.
Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon.
They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints in our hearts, and we are never, ever the same.

And sometimes things happen to you that may seem horrible, painful, and unfair at first, but in reflection you find that without overcoming those obstacles you would have never realized your potential, strength, willpower, or heart. Everything happens for a reason, nothing happens by chance or by means of luck. Illness, injury, love, lost moments of true greatness, and sheer stupidity all occur to test the limits of your soul. Without these small tests, whatever they may be, life would be like a smoothly paved, straight flat road to nowhere. It would be safe and comfortable, but dull and utterly pointless. The people you meet who affect your life. And the success and downfalls you experience help to create who you become.

Even the bad experience can be learned from. In fact they are probably the most poignant and important ones.

If someone hurts you, betrays you, or breaks your heart, forgive them, for they have helped you learn about trust and the importance of being cautious when you open your heart. If someone loves you, love them back unconditionally, not only because they love you, but because in a way, they are teaching you to love and how to open your heart and eyes to things.

Make every day count!!! Appreciate every moment and take from those moments everything that you possibly can for you may never be able to experience it again. Talk to people that you have never talked to before, and actually listen. Let yourself fall in love, break free, and set your sights high. Hold your head up because you have every right to. Tell yourself you are a great individual and believe in yourself, for if you don’t believe in yourself; it will be hard for others to believe in you.

You can make of your life anything you wish. Create your own life then go out and live it with absolutely no regrets.

Dancer lost in dancing- OSHO

Can one be absorbed in doing something- for instance, these active techniques-with absolute total intensity, and at the same time remain a witness who is separate, apart? 

OSHO: The same is the problem in many forms. You think that a witness is something apart, separate. It is not. Your intensity, your wholeness, is your witness. So when you are witnessing and doing something you are not two-the doer is the witness. For Example, You are dancing: the dancer and the witness are not two, there is no separation. The separation is only in language. The dancer is the witness. And if the dancer is not the witness then you cannot be total in the dance, because the witness will need some energy and you will have to divide yourself. 

A part will remain a witness and the remaining will move in the dance. It cannot be total, it will be divided. And this is not what is meant, because really this is the state of a schizophrenic patient -divided, split. It is pathological. If you become two you are ill. You must remain one. You must move totally into the dance, and your totality will become the witness. It is not going to be something set apart, your wholeness is aware. This happens. So don’t try to divide yourself. While dancing become the dance, 

Just remain alert; don’t fall asleep, don’t be unconscious. You are not under a drug; you are alert, fully alert. But this alertness is not a part standing aloof; it is your totality, it is your whole being. But this is again the same thing as whether two lovers are two or one. Only on the surface are they two, deep inside they are one. Only in language will you appear two, the dancer and the witness, but deep down you are the one. The whole dancer is alert. Then only peace, equilibrium, silence, will happen to you.

If you are divided there will be tension, and that Tension will not allow you to be totally here and now, to merge into existence. So remember that, don’t try to divide. Become the dancer and still be aware. This happens. This will happen to you also. This may have happened to many already. But remember this: don’t get split. Remain one and yet aware.

And Dancing is not passive, it is very active. In the end you become movement; the body is forgotten, only movement remains. Really, dancing is a most unearthly thing, a most unearthly art, because it is just rhythm in movement. It is absolutely immaterial so you cannot hold on to it. You can hold on to the dancer, but never to the dancing.

It just withers in the cosmos. It is there, and then it is not there; it is not here, and then suddenly it is here - it comes out of nothing and it is here - it comes out of nothing and then, again, goes into nothing. A dancer is sitting here; there is no dancing in him. But if a poet is sitting here, poetry may be in him; poetry can exist in the poet.

A painter is here: in a very subtle way, painting is present. Before he paints, painting is there. But with a dancer nothing is present, and if it is present, then he is simply a technician and not a dancer. The movement is a new phenomenon coming in. The dancer becomes just a vehicle: the movement takes over.

One of the greatest dancers of this century was Nijinsky, and in the end he just went mad. He may have been the greatest dancer in all of history, but the movement became so much for him that dancer was lost in it. In his last years he was unable to control it. He could begin dancing at any moment, anywhere, and when he was dancing, no one could say when it would end. It might even continue the whole night.

When friends asked him, “what has become of you? You begin, and then there is no end,” Nijinsky said, “I am only in the beginning. Then something takes over and ‘I’ am no more - and who dances, I do not know.” He went mad. He was in a madhouse; he died in a madhouse.

Take any activity and go to the limit where there is either madness or meditation. Lukewarm search will not do.

OSHO. 

Osho has used all sort of creative expressions for taking people into meditation, and dancing is one of them and one of most important medium also, as many people loves to dance. According to osho, if one can be total in dancing then it becomes a meditation. In fact in any activity, if we involved our self so totally, that we are no longer present, then it becomes a meditation. Totality is the key in any form of meditation. Similarly when we dance with totality then one moment comes, when dancer is lost and only dance is left and dancing has become a meditation.

During the peak of Michael Jackson’s career when he was performing to sold-out audiences across the globe, he released some statements about his strange/unique experiences.

Here is a quote from Michael Jackson on his dancing:

“The awareness is expressed through creation.

This world we live in is a dance of the creator.
The dancers appear and disappear at a glance
But the dance is still living.

On many occasions when I am dancing,
I am touched by something sacred.
In these moments I feel my spirit is raised 

and become one with all there is
I become the winner and the subjugated,
I become the master and slave,
I become the singer and song,
I become the expert and the known.
Still dancing and then this is the eternal dance of creation.
The creator and creation merge in one of joy.

-Still dancing – and dancing – and dancing,
      -Until there is only the dance”

-Michael Jackson

Only a person who has enjoyed his life becomes capable of enjoying his death.

You think about death and you become disturbed by small things: a headache, an ant crawling on your body. You become distracted by such small things; small discomforts—and you talk about death. Maybe you don’t know what death is; maybe you have only heard the name.  and you have seen people dying, but you yourself have never seen death. In fact, when a person dies you see him lying in repose—silent, relaxed, with no discomfort. You think death is not a discomfort? You are seeing only a dead person; you have not seen his inner misery, you have not seen his inner conflict. You have not seen his inner struggle with death. You have not seen his inner anguish and turmoil. You just see the dead body—painted, dressed well, washed, cleaned.

At the moment of death all your knowledge of the world will be lost into thin air. Only one thing will go with you, and that one thing is being constantly ignored- that is your self-knowledge, your self-realization. In fact, this is the only ignorance- ignoring yourself. It is always death that comes before your desires are fulfilled. Even if you live for a thousand years your desires are not going to be fulfilled.

Only a person who has enjoyed his life becomes capable of enjoying his death. And if you are capable of enjoying your death, you have defeated death. Then there is no more birth for you and no more death for you--- you have learnt the lesson.

Live deeply, live totally, live wholly, so when death comes and knocks at your door you are ready—ready like a ripe fruit to drop. Just a small breeze comes and the fruit drops; sometimes even without the breeze the fruit drops from its own weight and ripeness. Death should be like that. And the readiness has to come through living.

The secret is, start living more fully, more totally. Be more alert so that you can find within yourself something that is unreachable by death. That is the only shelter, the only security, the only safety. And if you want to help your friends and family, let them become aware of this secret.

Life is a flux - OSHO

I am here to shatter all illusions. Yes, it will irritate you, it will annoy you-that’s my way of functioning and working. I will sabotage you from your very roots! Unless you are totally destroyed as a mind, there is no hope for you.

Discipline has been misinterpreted. People have been telling others to discipline their life, to do this, not to do that. Thousands of shoulds and should-nots have been imposed on man, and when a man lives with thousands of shoulds and should-nots he cannot be creative. He is a prisoner, everywhere he will come across a wall.

The creative person has to dissolve all shoulds and should-nots. He needs freedom and space, vast space, he needs the whole sky and all the stars, only then can his innermost spontaneity start growing.

So remember, my meaning of discipline is not that of any ten commandments, I am not giving you any discipline, I am simply giving you an insight how to remain learning and never become knowledgeable. Your discipline has to come from your very heart, it has to be yours-and there is a great difference.

When somebody else gives you the discipline it can never fit you, it will be like wearing somebody else’s clothes. Either they will be too loose or too tight, and you will always feel a little bit silly in them.

Mohammed has given a discipline to the Mohammedans, it may have been good for him, but it cannot be good for anybody else. Buddha has given a discipline to millions of Buddhists; it may have been good for him, but it cannot be good for anybody else. A discipline is an individual phenomenon; whenever you borrow it you start living according to set principles, dead principles. And life is never dead; life is constantly changing each moment. Life is a flux

One has to be alert to, watchful of, each situation and its nuances, and one has to respond to the situation according to the moment, not according to any readymade answers given by others.

Do you see the stupidity of humanity? Five thousand years ago, Manu gave a discipline to the Hindus and they are still following it. Three thousand years ago Moses gave a discipline to the Jews and they are still following it. Five thousand years ago Adinatha gave his discipline to the Jainas and they are still following it. The whole world is being driven crazy by these disciplines! They are out of date; they should have been buried long long ago. You are carrying corpses and those corpses are stinking. And when you live surrounded by corpses, what kind of life can you have?

I teach you the moment and the freedom of the moment and the responsibility of the moment. One thing may be right this moment and may become wrong the next moment. Don’t try to be consistent, otherwise you will be dead. Only dead people are consistent. Try to be alive, with all its inconsistencies, and live each moment without any reference to the past, without any reference to the future either. Live the moment in the context of the moment, and your response will be total. And that totality has beauty and that totality is creativity. Then whatsoever you do will have a beauty a beauty of its own.

OSHO 

LIFE IS AN EMPTY CANVAS _ OSHO

IS NOT LIFE NOTHING BUT MISERY?

It depends on you. Life in itself is an empty canvas; it becomes whatsoever you paint on it. You can paint misery, you can paint bliss.

This freedom is your glory. You can use this freedom in such a way that your whole life becomes a hell, or in such a way that your life becomes a thing of beauty, benediction, bliss, something heavenly. It all depends on you, man has all freedom. That’s why there is so much agony, because people are foolish and they don’t know what to paint on the canvas.

It is left to you, that is the glory of man. That is one of the greatest gifts of god to you. No other animal has been given the gift of being free; every animal is given an already fixed program.

All animals are programmed except man. A dog is bound to be a dog, and forever a dog, nothing else is possible, there is no freedom. He is programmed, everything is built in.The blueprint is there, he will simply follow the blueprint, he will be a dog. There is no choice for him, no alternatives are available. He is an absolutely fixed entity.

Except for man, everything is programmed. The rose has to be a rose, the lotus has to be a lotus, the bird will have wings, the animal will walk on four legs.

Man is utterly free, that is the beauty of man, the glory. The immense gift of god is freedom. You are left unprogrammed, you don’t carry a blueprint. You have to create yourself; you have to be self creative.

So it all depends on you, you can become a Buddha, a bahaudin, or you can become an Adolf Hitler, a Benito Mussolini. You can become a murderer or a meditator. You can allow yourself to become a beautiful flowering of consciousness, or you can become a robot.

But remember, you are responsible-and only you, and nobody else.

An optimist is a man who goes to the window in the morning and says, “Good morning, god” A pessimist is one who goes to the window and says, “My god it is morning?” it all depends on you. It is the same morning, maybe the same window, maybe the pessimist and the optimist are staying in the same room but it depends. And what a difference when you say, “good morning, god” and when you say”my god it is morning?”

I have heard an ancient Sufi parable.

Two disciple of a great master were walking in the garden of the master’s house. They were allowed to walk every day, morning and evening. The walking was a kind of meditation, a walking meditation- just as ZEN people do walking meditation. You cannot sit for twenty-four hours- the legs need a little movement, the blood needs a little circulation- so in Zen and in Sufism both, you meditate for a few hours sitting and then you start meditating walking. But the meditation continues, walking or sitting the inner current remains the same.

They both were smokers. They both wanted to ask for the permission of the master, so they both decided,”tomorrow. At the most, he will say no, but we are going to ask. And it doesn’t seem such a sacrilegious act to smoke in the garden, we will not be smoking in his house itself.” The next day they met in the garden. One was furious – furious because the other was smoking- and he said, “What happened? I also asked, but he simply flatly refused and said no. and you are smoking? Are you not abiding by his orders?” He said, “but he has said yes to me. “This looked very unjust. And the first said, “I will go and immediately inquire as to why he said no to me and yes to you,” The other said, “Wait a minute. Please tell me what you had asked.” He said, what I had asked? I had asked a simple thing, ‘can I smoke while meditating?’  He said no! And he looked very angry. The other started laughing; he said ‘now I know what is the matter. I asked, can I meditate while smoking? He said yes.’

It all depends. Just a little difference, and life is totally something else. Now there is a great difference. Asking, “can I smoke while meditating?” is just ugly. But asking, “Can I meditate while smoking?” – It’s perfectly okay. Good! At least you will be meditating. Life is neither misery nor bliss. LIFE IS AN EMPTY CANVAS, and one has to be very artistic about it. 

A tramp knocked at the door of an inn named “George and the dragon”. “Could you spare a poor man a bit to eat?” he asked the woman who answered the door. “No!” she screamed, slamming the door. A few seconds later, the tramp knocked again. The same woman answered the door. ”could I have a bit to eat?” said the tramp. “Get out, you good–for-nothing!” shouted the woman. “And don’t you ever come back!” after a few minutes the tramp knocked at the door again. The woman came to the door. “Pardon,” said the tramp, “but could I have a few words with George this time?”

Life is the inn called “George and the dragon”. You can ask to have a few words with George too.

OSHO